When the bustle of a city slows, towns dissolve into abandoned buildings or return to woods and crumble into the North Georgia clay. In 1832, Auraria was one of the sites of the original American gold rush. The remains of numerous towns dot the landscape - pockets of life that were lost to fire or drowned by the water of civic works projects. Cassville was a booming educational and cultural epicenter until 1864. Allatoona found its identity as a railroad town. Author and professor Lisa M. Russell unearths the forgotten towns of North Georgia.

The book is a celebration of the 200th anniversary of Clayton Baptist Church, Clayton, Georgia, which was founded on August 14, 1819. The church is older than its county. The Cherokee populated this area of Northeast Georgia, the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains. The first pastor was a missionary to the tribe. The church epitomizes the faith of our fathers, living still. This publication is our humble effort to record the struggles and victories in the founding and growth of our church and to preserve the heart, soul, and mind of a determined and courageous people whose abiding faith in an eternal world to come enabled them to build a beloved church that would promote taking the good news to the uttermost parts of the world. Today, we can almost hear the encouraging whispers of our forefathers, who are part of our forever family.